Photos

This is the picture I am planning on using for my front cover. I believe it is suitable because its an appropriate camera shot and captures the key features of the artist. The camera angle is a mid shot but slightly close up. When planning this photo, I ensured the person I was using in the photo wore the appropriate clothing as well as taking up a correct pose. I used a set of headphones that I owned to create the link with a DJ and the dance music industry. I thought it would be a good idea for the artist to be pointing at the camera because my plan for the front cover is to be a connotation with the famous photo from American "your country needs you". The headline I am planning on using is, "DJ SKULL KANDY needs you". Therefore the picture is appropriate for what the front cover is going to be portraying. I plan to edit the photo before using it on my front cover but will discuss this in a later blog.

This is a second option that I was going to be using for my front cover image. I decided to experiment and try and take photos using different levels. I got the person I was taking the photo of to stand on top of an object and see what the photo came out like. I wanted to give of the impression that the artist was tall and therefore was going to use the headline, "DJ SKULLKANDY towering to new heights". I am still unsure about whether or not to use this photo as part of my front cover, I feel the one above is the stronger photo and therefore slightly edges it. However I plan to edit this photo, by changing the background to a club scene to see what it looks like with a differing back image.

This is a photo I took which I am not happy about. I will not be including this image into my final piece. The image is not suitable for a front cover of a magazine because you can not see the artists face. The idea of attracting consumers to buy your magazine is being able to show a cover image which would attract them. It is difficult when buying a magazine to make a purchase if you can not see who is on the front of it. The picture is also wrong because the image is disorienatated and the artist looks as if they are not ready for the photo. Having the hands in the pockets is often seen as a model pose but im my opinion it just looks lazy and therefore I would not use this image in my magazine.

Font Possibilities

In this blog I am going to be discussing all of the fonts i am considering for my magazine front cover and body text, all of the fonts I am going to be analysing are from http://www.dablog.com/. The first font I am considering is the one on the left which is known as blockface. This type is simple and therefore could be useful on my front cover when considering things such as sub headings and headline stories. The text in itself I feel represents the dance music genre. This is due to its technological feel and modern style. If i was to use the text, it would be of a different colour, such as green which would be more suitable. Possibly it could also potentially look better with a green glow coming around the outside of it but this is something I would have to edit myself.

This is the font I am considering for my main title on the front cover of the magazine. I like the idea of it because the design, again is suited to the dance industry. The font instantly stood out to me because it is named clubland which is obviously a type of music from within the dance music genre. It also looks as if it is made up from lots of light bulbs which links in nicely with my magazines name which is obviously named after the strobe light. I am also planning on using this font for my contents page.

This is a font I came across that I think will again be best suited for my front cover. When considering what article/picture to put onto my front page I did some research into dance music artists and had a look at thier logos/fonts etc used on magazine and CD covers. I noticed that artists such as tiesto, darren styles, all keep the same fonts on all of thier products and very rarely change them. Therefore the DJ who is going to be headlining my magazine is a fictional artist called " DJ SKULL KANDY", I will be using the above font for DJ SKULL KANDY all the way through my magazine when using his name.

All of my fonts above are as a result of a survey I conducted with consumers of the dance music magazine genre. These were the most popular and therefore I will be using them in my magazine. I conducted the survey so that I can be certain my magazine would appeal to my target audience, as I believe strongly a magazine should be based upon what the consumer wants to see to be successful in the market.

To ensure I was making the right decisions I compared my fonts with the fonts from mix-mag which obviously has a heavy influence on the production of my magazine. I was sure to not differ my fonts to vastly from mix-mags because it is a popular magazine within the dance industry and this is how I would like my magazine to be. Therefore all of the fonts above that have been analysed are popular within the target audience due to the survey and similar to mix mag which is already successful.

Flat Plan Designs

This is the front cover i have designed for my music magazine. I spent some time contemplating what name to choose for my magazine. I wanted it to be attractive and catchy with a slogan that will be remembered like all other magazines from this particular part of the market. I settled with the name "Strobe". I made this decision because the term strobe is often associated with a strobe light which can be found in most clubs. Therefore the link between the two is instantly noticeable and the title is a memorable one. Alongside my magazine title I wanted to incorporate a slogan which will be associated with the title. The slogan i have chosen is "the music magazine that's lighting up the nation", despite the fact it may be slightly cheesy I feel that it will work well in helping people remember the magazine. The title is the main part of the front cover as it is important when selling a magazine to make sure the title is easy to see and read from a distance, because when on the shop floor it is important that the magazine title stands out so that it can be spotted and bought by the consumer. Therefore as well as the title being large i am also thinking of the colours on the front page being luminous yellow or orange to help it stand out more. Also these colours link in with clubbing and the rave scene so are therefore relevant. I positioned what is in the issue above the title. I thought this would be suitable because when picking up the magazine and looking at what its called you can instantly see what is in the issue. I made sure when positioning elements onto my page that the pictures are the main element of the page because visual elements are more attractive to a consumer then lots of writing. I did however decide on having a relatively big headline to allow to the reader to establish what is in the issue.


This is my contents page that I designed. It is basic because it is a flat plan and not much detail has been put into it. Originally i wanted a normal contents page typical of any other dance music magazine. With simple listings of whats in the pages. But i feel a more suited contents page would be a more modern and designer one but still keeping with the dance music theme. I decided to have my contents page with lots of different shapes containing headlines and pictures. Due to the fact i have filled the contents page it gives the consumer the idea instantly that the magazine is full. The main articles have been placed into larger triangles with them getting progressively smaller in the order of preference. I have placed the word contents at the top of the page so that it is instantly noticeable that it is the contents page, as I believe it is an important part of any magazine and should be easy to find for the reader allowing them to establish what is going to be in the magazine. My original idea was to have it littered with pictures but for my main design I want to give it a more formal feel making sure the idea of the headlines being easily seen is kept.

With my double page spread i have decided to incorporate the idea from my contents page by keeping with the jagged shapes. A magazine is usually modelled around the same type of design and font, so this is what I intend to do in my double page spread. I also noticed when looking at other magazines from the dance genre that they all follow similar design throughout. Another thing I have noticed that they all include are quotations and lots of pictures to visually entise the reader.

Analysis of existing magazines

I have chosen two magazines to analyze they are both from the music genre, I will be using two different front covers, however I will be analyzing the contents and two page spread from MixMag. I will be comparing and contrasting the two covers and looking for ideas to use in my magazine.

This is a front cover from the magazine mix-mag. When looking at the cover, instantly the image stands out to me. It is an important factor to consider when producing a magazine. A huge selling point of a magazine is what or who is on the front of it. For this issue mix-mag have chosen the artist Sam Sparro. This is a wise decision as Sam sparro is a worldwide reknown electro/dance musician, therefore the more popular a person on the front cover the more likely a regular consumer is to buy. And due to the artists popularity mix-mag have chosen to have a large image. The colour scheme is visually pleasing and is maintained throughout the cover, ensuring the colours are not clashing. The layout is intresting, contrasting with the classic design of a front cover. All of the headlines and sub-headlines are facing inwards in different directions and adds a slight informal feel to the cover which i think is what the publishers are trying to achieve. Also at the top of the pages there are two small captions about whats in the issue, "Free Armin Van Burren CD- Huge club guide 1,203 nights out". The language is focused on causing the reader to read on more, with words such as Huge and using the figure 1,203. The figure is also highlighted in yellow as it is the main part of the sentence this is the same with Almin Van Burren in the other caption.


The next cover is from the magazine DJ MAG. DJ Magazine is,as of Janurary 1991 ,a monthly magazine dedicated to Electronic Dance Music and DJs. The magazine has styled itself as "the world's largest selling dance music magazine and currently claims sales of 27,500. The magazine cover differs to mix-mag's in the fact that it has a lot more going on in the cover. It follows a colour scheme just like mix-mag however it dosen't seem as suitable. When looking at the cover it is difficult to distinguish between articles and pick out words from the background. It also packs more articles onto its front cover, with the main article being smaller then mix-mag's. I can only imagine this is because the main article involves people who arn't too well known to the public. It has more packed onto the cover then mix-mag this could be because of the fact that it isn't as popular as mix-mag and needs to entise its audience further by adding more onto the cover that could lead to someone buying it. The language is basic and dosen't use persuasive language. It is different to lots of other magazines due to the fact it has packed a lot of colours and pictures onto its front cover, however this is good because it would stand out on a shelf in a shop.

This is the contents page from mix-mag, when looking at it firstly. It dosen't appear to take the usual format of a contents page, it has a large title at the top which has nothing to do with the genre of dance or signifys that it is a contents page. The picture is the main focus of the page. Without reading the magazine, it seems that the picture is irrelevant to the dance music genre. The stories and sections are clearly highlighted down the left hand side of the page but take a back seat in the layout of the page. At the bottom highlighted in a blue box it reads "All the hottest releases reviewed and rated". This is possibly because it is a key part of the magazine or the main article, therefore it gets a box of its own. This is likely to be down to the fact that consumers mostly read this magazine for the album and venue reviews. In addition the magazine comes with a key in the top right corner in relation to the magazines grading system for albums and tracks. This is a good place to base the key as it is one of the first things the consumers sees when opening the magazine.


This is the two page from mix-mag. It is layed out suitably and despite having large images there is also the content with blocks of writing. The way the blocks of text have been layed out is intresting and despite having lots of it, it takes an informal style across the two pages. There is a colour scheme throughout the page which is suitable to the magazine. However if someone was looking at this without knowing what magazine genre it was from, it wouldn't be instantly recognisable as dance magazine. It looks as if the page has 3 different perspectives of the same story which is effective when keeping a reader intrested in the magazine. Overall it is an effective layout and looks modern and visually pleasing.

Target Audience

To work out what target audience to aim my magazine at, i visited mixmag's website (http://www.mixmag.net/) for some advice through their media pack. Mixmag is a British dance music and clubbing magazine. It styles itself as "the world's biggest selling dance music magazine". I have pasted an image of the media pack into this blog, however it is difficult to read so I will type up the results found.

Mixmag readers are the opinion formers and leaders in clubbing. They are the ones who make the happening music happen and the cool products cool within their peer group. They are the first to recommend a new tune and the first on a new fashion trend. They're at that new cool club very early and they move on before it starts to go cold . They're the best informed about top DJs and upcoming tunes, and they just have to have the latest mobile (even if their current one is less than six months old). They're the biggest downloaders of music in the UK.

The median age of a Mixmag reader is 26 - 72% male, 28% female - and they tend to be urban and single. They have a high disposable income and a high propensity to spend it on, Nearly 80% do not read another music magazine and they spend little time watching TV, especially at weekends.

1. Nights out

2. Clothes
3. Tunes
4. The latest mobile and MP3 player

Knowing the target audience is very important when producing a magazine as it is always good to know what area of the public your magazine will be aiming at. When finding this out you could do what i have done and conduct research into it or it could be done in other ways such as questionaires. When looking at psychographics of my magazine readers it is quite difficult to distinguish between which group they belong to. I believe that they most belong into groups such as aspirers and Individualists. Aspirers are people who want to have more money or status and will often buy “flashy” products to try to send out messages about status. An individualist is someone who wants to show the world they are different.

Another magazine from the same music genre is a magazine called DJ MAG.It bases itself on similar factors as mixmag. Its target audience is the same as mixmags and come from similar backgrounds. The graph on the left is showing the target audience in clearer detail. The demographics of the magazine are,it has a youthful audience with an average age of around 26, it is male dominated making up 94% of the target audience and 67% of these males are single with money. 70% are employed as well as 18% being students. The second graph is showing the statistics from how often the consumers go clubbing. Due to the fact the magazine is a dance/clubbing magazine I would have expected these statistics to be of high order, which they are. This gives me a bit of psychographic background into the reader, i would believe them to be succeeders which means they have more money to spend than aspirers but won’t feel the need to show it as much. They choose to spend there money on clubbing.

Main Coursework

Introduction
In this task I have been asked to produce a magazine based around a genre of music. The genre of music I am focusing on is the dance music genre, i have chosen this genre because it is a wide genre and rather unspecific, because there are a number of different types of dance music (e.g hardcore, rave, mixes). Also there are not many magazines created specifically for the dance music industry so I feel there is a gap in the market for this type of magazine. This task is a development of my skills i acquired previously in my preliminary piece of coursework (find below), i aim to build upon these skills I have learnt and produce a magazine to emulate my previous one.

Final Evaluation

This is my finished front cover. I chose to incorporate the image i published in my earlier blog as it was a good image. In my front cover i stuck to a color scheme which i think is effective when producing a magazine, I followed this color scheme through into the contents page. Despite changing my original flat plan, I think the decision payed off. Something i would of changed though however is incorporating the Sussex downs logo. This was difficult due to copyright but I feel that without the logo the magazine does not advertise its affiliation with the college. Despite this though I am reasonably happy with my final front cover.

This is my final design for my contents. We was told not to produce a final piece and just to do a basic outline of what our contents would involve. I think it is important for a contents to have images to support the stories that will be inside the issue and visually attract readers. I have split my contents into two sections, i have seen this done in many magazines and this is where i got the idea from. I split the two into two main areas which is, main stories and Sport on the downs classic, which i have abbreviated. I believe this gives the magazine a more organized feel
and allows the reader to distinguish between what they want to read and what not. Due to the fact that this is not a final contents it is hard to evaluate but if i was to change anything i would possibly add more sections to my magazine to make it more interesting. But I am overall pleased with the result.

Flat Plans

This is the flat plan for my front cover of my magazine. I have chosen a suitable layout including a large title which personally i feel is key when creating a magazine to attract consumer audiences. The image is also dominating across the front cover along with the title, as a picture speaks a thousand words and is again a key factor when attracting consumer audiences. My original plan was to incorporate the sussex downs logo into my cover to show its affiliation with the college, however i was told that this can not be done so therefore the logo will not be included in my final piece. My plan is also for the headline stories to overlap the image which is difficult to portray when drawing a flat plan.



This is the flat plan of my contents page. I decided to change the font and style of my contents page, however this was down to it being hard for me to duplicate my design for the front cover. When producing my final piece, i will keep the headings of the pages the same due to the fact i think its important for a magazine to contain a constant design throughout. I would have also incorporated the logo into my contents page had i been able to do so. The dominating factor on the page will be the page numbers and stories, this is down to the fact that is the most important part and main function of the contents. I also think i will put some images into the design when creating it, to make the contents more visually pleasing and eyecatching.

Photographs

This is the image i have chosen for my front cover it is a medium close up of a student that I believe to be suitable enough for a cover. The image is basic but shows an average student, therefore portraying my target audience through the photo, due to the fact i am aiming my magazine at all students. The picture does not so much portray a sporting theme in any way which is something I feel i could have interpreted more however the photo I believe still makes a good cover image.

The second image is a image that was taken which is not suitable for a magazine front cover. The image is not a medium close up and therefore does not capture the students face and when targeting my audience of students the magazine would possibly be more popular if the front cover was a fellow student who people recognised. Also the picture is very casual and does not represent sport in any way, therefore being unsuitable for a number of reasons.

Introduction

I have been asked to design and produce a front cover and a contents page for a college magazine. I have chosen to base my magazine around the genre of sport, with a magazine focused on college sports teams and news.